The new masteries:

With an entirely new system built for masteries the options have opened up for the players. It no longer feels like you’re building your masteries around the specific champion you’re playing but more like you’re building them around how you plan to play out the entire game, moulding your masteries around you as a player and your own play style. With more strength around the bottom of the mastery trees instead of the strength being spread around them you’re going to want to focus on a main tree before heading into the others, there are still 3 main mastery trees “Ferocity”, “Cunning” and “Resolve”. Each of these mastery trees have their own aggressive and defensive options but also due to the new “Keystone Masteries” each tree is specifically designed to give more utility, defence or offense.

To take a look at the new masteries and the “Keystone” system head over to the official Riot site here where you can decide how you want to play your games!

Marksmen Updates:

After the recent changes that added the juggernauts to the game, Riot has given the Marksmen of the league a similar change. 6 of our beloved AD carries have been reworked, Caitlyn, Kog’Maw, Corki, Graves, Miss Fortune and Quinn now each have different mechanics or tweaks that you might not remember, that’s because they’re completely fresh and absolutely game changing! Let’s go over them;

Miss Fortune:

“Bullet Time now lasts longer and fires increasing waves of bullets as she levels her ult, while we’re moving Strut over to her W and giving her a bran new passive tentatively titled… Love Tap. With it, MF will deal increased damage to targets other than the one she last shot at. She has two guns, and by constantly switching targets, she’ll deal huge amounts of pain to multiple victims. Finally, Impure Shots doesn’t last as long, but gives her much more attack speed, and crucially lasts longer every time Miss Fortune deals extra damage with Love Tap.”

These changes to Miss Fortune have seen her impact increase significantly along with the other Marksmen of the game. Hopefully now with these changes she might just see some more competitive play like the good ol’ days.

Quinn:

“Blinding Assault no longer blinds (so uh… that’s going to need a rename), but its cooldown is reduced whenever Quinn attacks enemies turned Vulnerable by Valor. Next up, we’re turning Quinn’s ult into a toggle, giving Demacia’s Wings the ability to MOVE. Most champions rely on Teleport to safely stray from their team, but League’s speediest champion can move about freely and split push – or counter a split push – anywhere on the map without needing summoner spells.”

Her largest change has come in the form of her ultimate working in a completely different way, giving her a massive speed boost which can be turned on or off however the damage on it took a hit as far as damage is concerned. In my opinion it’s a worthy trade off considering the mobility her ultimate can now provide.

Graves:

“We’re changing up Graves’ basic attacks so they behave like his Buckshot, meaning his basic attacks deal area of effect cone damage and knockback minions, although the three (yep – his shotgun still fires three rounds, and no, we still can’t explain it) rounds can each be blocked. Still on Graves’ basic attacks, he actually has an ammo system now, and reloads his gun after firing two rounds. Every round that lands reduces the cooldown on Quickdraw, which no longer grants attack speed but does reload his gun. Finally, we’re tweaking Buckshot, giving it a unique T shape attack that deals two rounds of damage.”

It’s not been mentioned in their small caption but Riot also reduced his range even more but worked in a system that makes him significantly tankier so he can’t be easily bullied. With this combination of changes Graves has seen a significant increase in play and winrate so far in the pre-season.

Did you read that? Removing the attack speed cap! This comes with both pros and cons. Kog’Maw can now deal an insane amount of damage attacking significantly faster than the 2.5 attacks per second that every other Marksman has but it comes at a cost! When you’re attacking so fast you’ll have trouble moving and be vulnerable to champions that come close, if they can even get close.

Corki:

“Corki’s always been League’s magic damage dealing marksman, something we’re reinforcing by tweaking his basic attacks to deal half magic and half physical damage. We’re reducing the range of his Valkyrie to make him a little less safe, but adding in something totally unique to the mustachioed aviator. Now, once he hits level six, Corki – or Corki’s ground staff – will spawn a crate of rockets and bombs back at HQ. Once Corki flies over one of his crates, he gets SUPERCHARGED, earning a homeguard boots-esque boost, increased base movement speed, and a supercharged Valkyrie that basically carpet bombs a huge area with napalm… but only for a small window of time. Basically, Corki has a minute to make a huge play once he picks up his Corki care package – whether or not he makes the most of his window will often separate the good Corkis from the great Corkis.”

His new crate system might be troublesome to get used to but as far as the Marksmen changes go it’s shown to be one of the strongest so far. Being able to launch yourself an entire screens distance and placing down an AoE similar to a rumble ultimate can be absolutely devastating to the enemy team! Or it can grant you that extra bit of safety if you’ve been playing aggressively. After his basic attack change he’s also become more difficult to itemize against so enjoy it while you can!

Caitlyn:

“Caitlyn’s traps now run on ammo, so the sheriff can lay down up to three at a time, and while trapped enemies no longer suffer damage, Caitlyn can hit them with a basic attack at much longer range to deal instant Headshot damage. She gets the same bonus off enemies caught by her 90 Caliber Net, too. Finally, we’re tweaking Cait’s Piltover Peacemaker, making the initial shot much thinner until it strikes a target – then her round bursts open and deals reduced damage to everything behind it.”

The phrasing on the Piltover Peacemaker may seem confusing but let me reassure you, it’s a positive change. The peacemaker now opens up on the enemy to deal the extra damage while travelling like the old one. Along with her other changes she’s a poking and sieging machine that’s benefitted greatly from the new masteries so much they’ve already had to give her a little nerf nudge so she’s not too overpowering.

To take a look at all of these changes in more detail along with the option to see preview videos of their new skills head over to the official Riot site here!

Vision Changes:

Ward Debris: Wards now leave behind corpses when they die, letting you know the warding habits of your enemies and teammates.

Trinket Changes: Trinkets now upgrade automatically and grow in strength as you gain levels. Blue Trinket has been removed, but Yellow now either works like before (2 wards on cooldown) or can be sidegraded to a long-range scout trinket, capable of dropping a visible 1-health ward with unlimited duration. Red Trinket now ‘reveals’ all units (monsters, champions, wards) it scans, acting as both a ward sweeper and brush checker. Red can also sidegrade into a personal radar that follows your champion around for a while, sweeping and disabling all wards as you go.

Sightstone Changes: Gold generation support items can now either upgrade into fully-fledged tier 3 items with powerful actives, or slot-efficient sightstones with gold generation stats. Additionally, we’ll be reintroducing the Ruby Sightstone, which will reduce the cooldown of all of your active items. So either you can go all-in on active items, or just finish that Sightstone before going traditional damage / tank support items.

The Rift Herald:

With all of these smaller changes made we can’t go and forget about the new map objective! With Baron pit being… Baron before 20mins and with Global Objectives being heavily focused on the bottom side of the map for a significant amount of time Riot have added a Rift Herald which will sit in the Baron pit from its spawn at 4mins right up to just before Baron’s own spawn at 20mins!

“It’s no secret that players who depart for the top lane can end up feeling isolated without a dragon to contest. Rather than just flipping the map on its head, we’re exploring ways to bring some relevancy to the north so top laners can feel like they’re interacting with their team before the 15 minute mark.”

It’s already out during the pre-season and you can see it in game but take note, its effect can be subject to change at any possible time much like the other things added in the pre-season.

“Defeat it, and gain a single target buff focused on early game power and pushing down the lane.”

It’s not easy to kill and it hits extremely hard so be cautions! The person who deals the killing blow receives the buff and range carries deal less damage to it! It has a mechanic that helps take it down which greatly assists in killing it fast, once in combat it’ll often open the eye on its back and if the eye is hit it’ll deal 15% of the Heralds HP in true damage, assisting in quickly taking It down.

Changes to Ranked Queue:

Your solo queue will no longer be solo! Players will be able to queue up with any amount of their friends to form a team of 5 and join a dynamic queue! However it’s being balanced by matching you with enemies who are in a similar situation, if you’re in a group of 5 then chances are you’re against a group of 5 too, this was so it doesn’t ruin the ranked integrity and solo players can continue to be comfortable playing on their own. Other barrier are in place to stop unfair matches, you’ll only be able to join friends that are at a similar rank to your own. Shortly after the dynamic queue release there will be IP rewards for those who choose to group with their friends so you’d better get contacting them to for your teams now!

“This upcoming season we’re replacing the solo/duo queue with a dynamic group queue, where you’ll be able to climb the ladder with any number of teammates.”

High ranking queue times were ridiculous but that’s coming to a change, matchmaking is changing for those of you who are high up the ladder and it should make your queue times significantly quicker. The spectrum for players being found in the matchmaking search is becoming broader so everyone can get into their games quicker.

Season 6 promotion helper is also arriving, this will only occur below the Gold 1 rank but it’ll come as an amazing gift for those of you who have trouble with multiple promotion match issues. If you lose a promotion series below gold 1 and manage to climb back to the series again you’ll start off with a win already in your series! This is being put in place at the start of the season to help players avoid ladder anxiety, promotion anxiety and will help them climb to their skill level more quickly without facing outlier challenges such as afks.

“We’re adding a new feature to help alleviate “promo anxiety,” better reflect improvements in skill, and make it easier to ladder up when climbing to your actual level.”

Poppy “Keeper of the Hammer” update:

Passive: Iron Ambassador – Every several seconds, Poppy throws her buckler as her basic attack, gaining range and bonus magic damage. Once thrown, Poppy can pick up her buckler to gain a shield, but if an enemy walks over her buckler, they’ll temporarily destroy it. If Iron Ambassador kills the target, the buckler returns to Poppy instead of falling to the ground.

Q: Hammer Shock – Poppy smashes the ground, dealing damage and slowing enemies in a small area. After a moment, the crushed ground erupts, dealing the same amount of damage again.

R: Keeper’s Verdict – Poppy charges up her hammer for a mighty blow, slowing herself as she winds up. With the second cast, Poppy unleashes a massive hammer smash, creating a fissure that deals damage and knocks back all enemy champions in a tiny area an enormous distance towards their base. The fissure length and knockback increase with channel duration.

Along with all of her spell changes she’s been visually updated with animations and more! If you’re interested in seeing it all in action then head over to their site where it’s all easily accessible.

To get more in-depth information about the update on Poppy “Keeper of the hammer” then head over to their updated site at Riot and you’ll even be able to see clips of how her skills work!